Four Teenage Girls Tricked into Prostitution Narrate their Ordeal

Four teenage girls, who were lured into prostitution in a notorious Calabar brothel, Vegas Flex, have narrated how they sleep daily with more than 20 men and their ‘Madam’ collects the proceeds.

Vanguard gathered that the four girls, who all hail from Okun Local Government Area of  Benue state, Felicia Nzuworgar, 17; Patience Williams, 18; Angela Benjamin, 17 and Charity Nkwogor said Abigail Aliyu whom they call “Chair Lady” took them from their homes in  Benue State, January this year on the pretext that she was taking them to Lagos to work as sales girls in her beer parlour, but ended up as sex workers in the  brothel located at 26 Bedwell Street, Calabar.

Narrating their ordeal, one of the girls Felicia said: ”The woman told me that she has a beer parlour in Lagos and wanted me to work as sales girl there, but when we got here she gave me boxer shorts to wear and when I asked her where the drinking parlour is for me to start working, she said I should hustle like other girls by sleeping with men and when I refused she beat me up.”

The girls, with different marks on their bodies, said the ‘Chair lady’ beat them to submission, adding that when they started it was very painful as they were not used to sleeping with such large number of men daily.

Another girl, Patience recounting her experience said: ”Every day we sleep with over twenty men for N500 each and  because we are young, men do line up to have us. At about 12 midnight, ‘Chair Lady’ will  come in and collect the money, because she  counts  the condoms she gives to us, if you do not  give her all the money she will beat you mercilessly.”

The girls also said their madam and the men working for her normally, searched their  room and their bodies  at the  close of each day to ensure they had not hidden any money and if any money was found on them, they beat them up, adding that when they first arrived in Calabar, the Chair lady collected their phones and did not allow any of them to step outside the brothel for fear that they might run away.

They recounted how Angela and Charity where brutally beaten to a state of coma when they attempted to escape.

Angela said: ”When I tried running away, she brought a soldier and a policeman, who are her boyfriends, and they beat me up and poured tear gas in my eyes. I later fell sick because of that beating for many days.”

On why they followed the woman without letting their parents know, they said once the woman touched them on the shoulders they became confused and went with her.

Charity, narrating her story, said: ”I was walking in our market in Okun Local Government Area when she greeted me and touched me on the shoulder and that was how I followed her and we entered vehicle to Enugu to the house of a juju man, who prepared a medicine (concoction)  for  us to drink which she said  was to protect us from sickness, but  when we got to Calabar, she said if we run away the medicine the man gave us will make our private part  to rot.”

However, when the “Chair Lady” Abigail Aliyu was interrogated, she said her arrest by operatives of the Anti-Human Trafficking  operatives  of the Cross River State Police Command was due to jealousy, adding that she was not the one that brought the girls to Calabar.

John Eluu, Cross River State Police Public Relations Officer, said the woman will soon be charged to court after investigation and warned youths to be cautious and not go with anyone who promises them jobs in Lagos or any other town without any proof.

Photo credit: Vanguard